1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a protective gear, more particularly to an athletic protective gear for use in sports, e.g. in American football.
2. Description of the Related Art
U.S. Pat. No. 4,554,681 discloses a conventional athletic protective gear, as illustrated in FIG. 1, which is usually worn by an American football player and which includes a protective structural member 10 formed to overlie a body part (not shown) to be protected, a protective pad 12 made from depressible material and disposed between the protective structural member 10 and the body part (not shown), and four retainer units 11, each of which has a structure shown in FIG. 2. As illustrated in FIG. 2, in each of the retainer units 11, the structural member 10 has two openings 100 formed therethrough. A fastener strap 120 is secured on the protective pad 12 and has two opposed end portions 122, 124 which extend respectively through the openings 100 of the structural member 10, and two hook-and-loop elements 123 which are secured to the end portions 122, 124 respectively and which engage each other so as to retain the end portions 122, 124 on the external surface of the structural member 10. Thus, the protective pad 12 is confined between the structural member 10 and the body part (not shown).
A drawback of the conventional athletic protective gear is that the end portions 122, 124 of the strap 120 may be impacted directly during a match, thereby resulting in disengagement of the hook-and-loop elements 123 from each other.